


waking up (and getting up) has never been easy

by ydididodis



Series: sad rosa all the way [4]
Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: Amy Santiago mention, Angst, Anxiety, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff, HEAVY FUCKING ANGST, Hope you don’t hate me, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Kevin Cozner mention, Nightmares, PTSD, Sorry guys, Violence, rape tw, that’s been in my head for a long time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-25
Updated: 2019-01-25
Packaged: 2019-10-16 03:23:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17541731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ydididodis/pseuds/ydididodis
Summary: Gina turns on the bedside lamp. She takes Rosa’s sweaty face in her hands and looks her in the eyes, searching for answers. Trying to be the calm in the storm.“Babe, you’re not there anymore. You’re here. Safe, next to me in bed.”Gina doesn’t know what happened but she assumes it’s about her time in prison.It really broke her girlfriend.(post prison Rosa, but things happened and she doesn’t have words for it)





	waking up (and getting up) has never been easy

_It’s dark and he’s gripping her in a way that she can’t move. Helpless like a fish out of water. And granted, she’s terrified. She’d never admit it but fuck. This is straight up terror. She’s living her own personal nightmare._

_“Please, no! I don’t -“_

* * *

“I don’t - I can’t - I -“

She’s murmuring in her sleep. Thrashing around in bed, breath quickening before she startles out of her dream, sitting up. Gasping for air. 

She needs air. 

That’s when the person beside her wakes up as well, blindly looking for a still-bandaged hand to hold.

“Rosa. Look at me.” 

Gina turns on the bedside lamp. She takes Rosa’s sweaty face in her hands and looks her in the eyes, searching for answers. Trying to be the calm in the storm when she feels like her mind _is_ the storm. 

“Babe, you’re not there anymore. You’re here. Safe, next to me in bed.”

Even a few days later she doesn’t know what exactly happened but at least now she knows it revolves around Rosa’s time in prison. She still tries to remember parts she got told and she tries to comprehend them and it’s safe to say she hates being a detective. 

With the call just a week ago and what Rosa did to herself, they (read: Gina) decided it’s best if the Latina stays at hers for now. So Gina went back to Rosa’s apartment while said person was at work (she insisted she’s “perfectly fine, Gina” while rolling her eyes) to clean up the mess they left behind before rushing to the ER and to pick up some clothes for the her girlfriend to wear. 

It kills her to know that someone in prison did something to Rosa and she’d love to go back there and just... kill them. 

It really broke her girlfriend. And it really breaks her to see this version of her. Not the tough badass version the precinct gets to see but the 3am on a Wednesday night version that has an anxiety attack and has to try to remember how to breathe. 

The version that seems to appear more often lately.

The version that seems to take over her life. 

Rosa is looking for certainty and a promise in the blue greenish eyes of Gina. Is she safe? Is this a dream? A trick her mind plays on herself? What if she wakes up in a second and she’ll be in the cold bare room of the prison again?

She’s spiraling.

What is safe anyway. How can she be safe when the nightmare replays on her mind all the time. When it’s always in the back. Just waiting for the most unconventional moment to reach out and remind her of what happened. When it creeps up on her even at work, a space that’s supposedly safe? Safe, safe, safe. 

Safe sounds like lie coated in sugar and honey and she can’t breathe anymore. 

Something inside her has been... off ever since she came back from prison. It all happened so fast and if she’s honest with herself she never gave herself time to process everything that occurred. 

Afraid it’ll become too real to deal with. 

Prison.

It sends her straight back into her nightmare.

* * *

_She’s back in her prison cell. And she doesn’t know how she got here. Fuck. She doesn't want to be back there. She can’t be back there._

_All the shit that happened she never talked about. All the woman with pent up aggression, letting it out on her. Because she’s a cop._

_And in the beginning she defended herself._

_And then he happened._

_It started with him checking her out until she was done with his greedy looks and subtle licking of his lips._

_So she went straight into his direction. Wanting to beat him up._

_The attempt earned her her first week of isolation._

_After that he started a more aggressive approach of getting her to obey him. He was touching her in very inappropriate places when no one was paying attention._

_Not that anyone was giving a fuck anyway._

_She gave him a black eye._

_Another week of isolation._

_Then another incident where he grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her into a nearby room. Dark. Empty. No cameras. And he took advantage of her._

_After that she didn’t seem to have the energy to defend herself anymore._

_Just a shell of a woman staring blankly ahead because how did that happen? How could she have let it happen? Why her? Why didn’t she defend herself? Why did no one save her? Why couldn’t she save herself?_

_And the other inmates took it as an opportunity to use her as their human punching bag, a representative of the entirety of the police force._

_She ~~was~~ is terrified of every step she takes, every corner she rounds, every turn she has to take. That he’s there. _

_In the back of her mind she knows he’ll drag her back into the closet and this nightmare will replay again._

* * *

Gina carefully takes her girlfriend’s head and guides it to her breast. Rosa had been dissociative for at least 10 minutes now, just staring into nothing and tears running down her cheeks. 

“Focus on my heartbeat. Breathe with me. It’s easy, babe. In. And out. In...“

Gina doesn’t know what happened and she’s giving Rosa time to tell her. But seeing the detective so helpless, working herself up night over night and crying and only being able to sleep with Gina next to her and wearing her girlfriend’s black “GINA KNOWS BEST” hoodie makes her contemplate if she needs to push the Latina to get at least part of the story. To get details to put the puzzle pieces together herself. 

It just kills her to see the usually stoic and emotionless woman like this. Gasping for air and silently crying. And just not knowing why exactly. 

She decides she can’t push her or else she’ll push the frightened woman beside her away. And she can’t bear the thought of having to sleep without the detective by her side.

Or shortly summarized: she knows Rosa is trusting her but she’s worried. 

Since her return every door has to be open when they’re in different rooms. And music has to play or they have to talk. Silence is a big problem. 

And her eyes are darting around all the time. 

Nervous and anxious. 

Not being able to focus on something for more than 5 seconds. Like she’s looking for someone, waiting for them to come out of a dark hidden corner and attack. 

_Something is off._

It’s the one sentence repeating in both of their minds. But neither dares to speak up about it. 

Rosa is off. 

And her anxiety has been peaking.

The anxiety that this is all just a weird kind of fucked up dream she’ll wake out of any second. That Gina won’t be there next to her, her warm hands on her face and her voice telling her that it’s all going to be okay. That she just imagines her girlfriend’s lavender perfume encasing her. That she’s in her own bed, alone, or worse, back there. 

Then there are these voices shouting at her and overlapping in her head. Making her feel like she’s drowning in her own screams, only antagonizing the end. Every night she falls asleep out of exhaustion and wakes up screaming and sweating. 

And the nightmare haunting her not just by night but also while she’s at work. While she’s eating. While she’s peeing of all things.

Every. Damn. Second. 

Her mind seems to go in circles. Always passing the same thought: Why?

She’s like a wanderer in her own head, lost and without a map to guide her way through the thick of the forest and out into the light.

And she doesn’t know how to explain it. Not to herself. Not to her friends nor her girlfriend.

She feels like the moment she gave up fighting and just let it all happen was the moment a part of her died and she can’t stop mourning.

And if she really would be honest with herself she’d realize that at this point, she doesn’t know she will be okay. If she’ll ever be okay. 

She asks herself if there’ll ever be an end to all of this and sometimes she wishes she could speak with her mother about this. 

She misses her mother so fucking much. 

She’s not sure if okay is even a real word anymore. 

(In a few months she still won’t be okay but she will be better.

She will have talked to Gina about the incident. And to Amy as well. Mainly about her anxiety and stress and Amy will help her with coping mechanisms. 

She will have started therapy. Slowly coming back to herself. Not quite her old self but a slightly improved version that decides to be a bit more open about what’s going on in her head. 

She’ll have contacted her mother and they’ll have met up for lunch several times since then.

She’ll realize that it’s not a dream and Gina is real and they’re real. One day in the future she will tell the civilian administrator that she loves her. And she’ll be the first one to say it, to everyone’s surprise.)

(And Kevin will have won this particular bet. He knows she still doesn’t speak much to her family but at this point he sees her like the daughter he always wished for. And he’ll tell her how proud he is of her.)

**Author's Note:**

> I’m aware that this is going in circles and i just wanted to say that’s intended because that’s what anxiety feels like for me lately. 
> 
> Hope you liked it :)


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